Symbol Starts With

Company Matches

Pawlenty: If you can Google it, cut it

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Republican presidential hopeful Tim Pawlenty laid out an economic vision for America on Tuesday that would cut taxes and dramatically reduce the size and scope of government operations.

Among his more novel ideas: If you can find it on Google, the government shouldn't be doing it.

Pawlenty said those organizations "were all built for a time in our country when the private sector did not adequately provide those products. That's no longer the case."

Interpreted broadly, the test could spell the end of federal involvement in the storage of nuclear waste, environmental clean-up efforts and disaster relief -- all services that a Google search reveals are offered by private sector firms.

"I guess it's an interesting strategy," said Craig Jennings, director of federal fiscal policy at OMB Watch, a budget watchdog group. "You could probably find private investigators, so let's get rid of the FBI, and there are labs that do food inspections, so let's eliminate federal food inspectors."

In addition, the Minnesota Republican has broader plans for curtailing government spending. As president, he would ask Congress to grant him emergency authority to freeze spending at current levels, and then impound up to 5% of federal spending until the budget is balanced.

"The implausible thing is cutting spending that dramatically from today's levels," said Rudolph Penner, a former Congressional Budget Office director who is now a fellow at the Urban Institute. And Pawlenty would be hard pressed to carry through, Penner said, because his pledge would require drastic cuts to health care and Social Security.